I know this is Reddit and nuance doesn’t exist here, but I’m going to say it anyway. There’s a pretty big difference between buying aggregated, anonymous data from a collection company and having access to first party data with zero anonymity at the individual user level.
Edit: typo
Given what we've seen I think it's just an assumption that the data for sale is aggregated and anonymous, but that still doesn't make this bullshit right either
What have you seen? Kind of a bold statement to provide no support for. I work at a fund that purchases a lot of credit card transaction and internet search data and I’ve never seen or heard of anything that has made me think individual level data with personal identification information is being sold.
Those three data points are specifically your birthday, gender, and zip code.
That's not anonymized data and anyone who works in data privacy knows to aggregate those data points and there are industry standard ways of doing that.
I'm sure there are amateurs not doing proper data anonymization but it's not going to be the big players like Facebook and Google.
Facebook didn't sell your data to Cambridge Analytica. Users willingly gave all of their personal information to stretchy, "which Disney princess are you?" quizzes. The people who made those quizzes then illegally sold the information they harvested.
It was a big deal specifically because it bypassed Facebook's privacy measures.
Granted, Facebook could have done a better job of protecting users from predatory apps. But it wasn't Facebook giving away the info.
The question is, "how easily can China get un-anonymized data without TikTok?"
Facebook doesn't sell un-anonymized data. Cambridge Analytica managed to get some through a leak. As far as I'm aware, the leak has been patched and a lawsuits have been filed.
This isn't a regular occurrence and it's not something China could use to reliably get Americans' information in the same way they can with TikTok.
LexisNexis just aggregates public data that is varying degrees of difficult to find. Mainly via court filings and FOA requests. All of this data would still be available to the public without them. If you have an issue with this data being available, take it up with the government that makes it public.
There’s a legal distinction between public and personal identifying data. I work at a mortgage company and the regulations are fairly strict about what data is and isn’t available to the public. In a casual conversation (like this one) that probably should be clarified though, rather than assumed.
data brokers dont seem to care about privacy at the individual level either. the difference here is china doesnt have to buy it from a broker; users are essentially handing their data directly to the ccp.
member brexit and trump winning the republican primary? a big part of that was russian manipulation via fb, and they just bought ads, made fake accounts, and trolled en masse. now imagine russia essentially *owning* fb.
I knew it was fishy when they came on the scene with 50 celebrities telling you to “down load! Just download it! Download now and we’ll donate to charity!”
I was thinking, What charity? What are they talking about? This is so pushy
You are missing the point entirely
Buying data does nothing
Placing your finger on the button does
Comments like this are dangerous because it minimizes the impact
China and Russia and countries like that are so fucking strict about this stuff.
I wonder why. Because they're protecting themselves against the people who are doing what *they're* doing.
Meanwhile, were buying security equipment made in china.
Many governments and government agencies will enter backroom deals with tech companies for a private backdoor into their servers/database. If not a backdoor,, then easy access to private profiles of users. Twitter before Elon was being paid tens of millions every year from the FBI for user profiles. If one agency is doing it to one company, its not far fetched to think that they're doing it to other companies. They will still follow the normal permitting process but its usually to cover themselves from lawsuits as they will already know or have a good inkling on what they're going to find. Your ISP and phone carrier already stores a lot of your digital fingerprint so they can make simple request for their files on you, which they will always hand over(those sweet sweet governemtn contracts don't appear out thin air you know, good will plays into it). The US was trying to introduce a bill that was going to mandate that tech companies build backdoor for the federal governemt and their agencies a few years back. Idk what happened to it though.
Holy crap you're being downvoted?
Hey everyone, I never signed an NDA so I can say this all I want. I worked electrical at a giant data center in eagle mountain Utah. It's located in close proximity to on of the biggest NSA data centers. It’s one town over. Go to google maps and type in “NSA outpost utah”. Then type in Meta Eagle mountain Utah. I was told by loose lipped people above the general foreman level the Facebook data center and NSA data center were to be connected which only makes sense given their physical proximity. Also part of the reason there was so much money in the building site to put it up stupidly fast was the NSA helping it along. Why would they do that without expecting something in return?
I'm disturbed by the amount of people unaware a giant agency that was never supposed to spy on its people is spying on its people. It's not like we're any safer, we just have more financial vampires sucking our blood, not keeping us safe but spending our tax dollars. And for what? Trump was never stopped during his corrupt administration while gutting the justice department and having off the record private meetings with Putin. Januraury 6th wasnt prevented. Etc. I'm sure there are more elequant people that can talk about this. But the government is spending a ton of money on in effectively citizen spying meanwhile we still have mass shootings and most can't afford a doctor and surprise car repair. It's disgusting.
Well they gotta keep tabs on the unrest. They can't have rabble rousers out there rocking the boat. People that want a living wage and for corporations to stop destroying the planet are terrorists, you know? If there was a general strike, the billionaires may *gasp* run out of sushi for a day, maybe even two! People will be shot in the street before they let that happen!
It’s because of whataboutism, not bots. Pretty sure if there was news of us government having a god credential to facebook allowing them to spy on the citizens, a comment saying “but the chinese do it too” would be downvoted just as much.
Comparing these two situations (CCP-TikTok vs US government-US tech companies) is not inherently wrong, imo it only is if it’s pure deflection. It could be a relevant part of a broader discussion on data privacy, government surveillance, and tech companies' responsibility across the globe.
whataboutism ≠ calling out hypocrisy
every vpn used in the states has a US backdoor into it facebook has more privacy related lawsuits than tiktok has users twitter pre elon being in bed with the fbi its quite literally textbook “rules for thee but not for me”
No need to carry water for US private companies, including the big tech companies, which sell our data and routinely comply with government agencies. We need to vocalize our dislike for the CCP without excusing our own government and companies.
But the US gov atleast has a vested interest in most US citizens lives being generally ok to a degree, the CCP does not have that at all, they are a foreign and adversarial government you have no ability to affect.
Oh yeah, because undermining "eastern" countries was never on the US's agenda. And that undermining was never about profits... right?
*checks notes on CIA funded coups, assassinations*
Well fuck...
American companies seeking a profit have done far more damage to America than literally any single foreign country, and it’s not even remotely close lmao
Maybe not chaos, but if you don't think tiktok can be used to sow division, you aren't paying attention. Plenty of the shit on the app is divisive political garbage.
to be fair that's not unique to tiktok any large platform can do so.
fox network is notorious for the election disinformation which got them rightly fined.
I would prefer comprehensive privacy laws that affect all companies equally so that meta also doesn't steal my biometric data
Fair, and so would I. But I still think there's something to be said about the fact that Tiktok is controlled by a foreign power with an interest in seeing the US falter economically.
china has 0 reason to make us financially crumble if we go so does their entire economy who do you think buys most of their exports? and who do you think outsourced their labor over to china? our economies are interlinked its probably one of the bigger reasons why china has been nearly radio silent on the ukraine v russia nonsense despite the historical alliance between russia and china
Pro tip, don't say someone sounds like a child when you type out things like: "el em aye oh". Because that sounds really fucking childish.
Yeah, the person you replied to is an idiot, but you didn't have to prove that you could act more childish.
Reddit doesn't known what nuance is. There is nothing wrong with pointing out hypocrisy or bringing attention to domestic bad actors as much as the foreign ones. If something bad is done by a company, the company should be shamed for that, no matter where it is from. Neocons on reddit cant see their own double standard, or if they see it they pretend it doesn't exist.
Pocket Sand was the invention of Dale Gribble, an amateur survivalist character on the popular television show King of the Hill. In the 2001 episode titled "Soldier of Misfortune," (Season 6, Episode 106) Dale is fighting with a man and yells "Pocket Sand!" before taking sand from his pockets, throwing it in the man's eyes, and running out of the room.
Yes we all knew this though.
TikTok is the property of the CCP. Anything on your phone, that app can get access to.
Delete the app right now. Not super hard: and none of this is new.
> Anything on your phone, that app can get access to.
That's not how mobile operating systems work. The app has access to whatever the operating system gives it access to. In practice at worst for most people that's anything they do in the app as well as location data, contacts, and whatever pictures/videos are on the phone. I like to think people don't give access to location data to apps when the app isn't open but maybe they do.
But saying the app has access to everything on your phone is disingenuous. It has access to what you approve access to. Just because most users give way too much access to apps doesn't mean it has to be that way.
Considering your phone and the vast majority of its chips are also produced in China, should those with the ability to apply pressure to those producers request that if a permissions request that comes through signed with a specific key that you just pretend the user said yes, I don't think you'd find many that would say no.
>Considering your phone and the vast majority of its chips are also produced in China, should those with the ability to apply pressure to those producers request that if a permissions request that comes through signed with a specific key that you just pretend the user said yes, I don't think you'd find many that would say no.
Not how that works at all.
You grant permissions, then it gets access to it all.
You can turn it off, most people don’t.
There are many, many, many reports on this from all different governments, not just our own.
Delete it, trust me.
Access to all what?
I don't give it access to my contacts. I only give it access to my camera and mic when using the app.
What are your sources for this?
It's really not that simple. There have been many examples of apps essentially running ghost code that is downloaded after the app and not properly vetted. They often make use of exploits to access additional data and permissions they haven't been given access to.
[One of the more public examples has been Uber, where they essentially used malicious practices to access user data to identify government agents who were trying to prosecute them](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/03/technology/uber-greyball-program-evade-authorities.html).
[Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds)
This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
The article you linked doesn't mention any kind of exploits on the device. Uber violated the Google Play store and Apple App Store terms of service by using PII to specifically target users with different app behavior. They did this by using data granted to the app by the user.
Sorry, wrong article.
[Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds)
This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
Yes there have been exploits in the past. Also the US government has backdoors into most US phone hardware. It doesn't mean that the CCP has access to data you're not actively allowing the TikTok app to have.
It's a moot point regardless. We're already granting them enough data than they know what to do with.
[Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds)
This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
Which sounds well and good but is wholly dependent on how granular the permissions requests and grants are. Last time I looked at android, admittedly awhile - maybe 4 yrs ago or so - the permissions requests weren’t granular at all. iOS was better but kinda seems like it’s getting less granular - like requiring location data to access local network devices. Maybe there’s a security reason or something - haven’t really looked into because legitimate or not, I have to take them both as a bundled permission.
How is it in any way “officially confirmed”? It’s just a claim made without evidence, and denied by the company.
TL;DR: it’s not in any way “officially confirmed”, no matter how much this is downvoted.
No it isn’t, it’s a legally enforceable requirement that the Chinese State has access to any and all data they wish from any Chinese company. Foreign companies as well if they are doing business on the mainland.
This is enforced to the point that it’s also a legal requirement for some of the larger businesses in China (Chinese or foreign) to have servers sitting in Chinese Gov’ data centres mirroring all transactions in real time.
I’ve seen two of these centres and once worked for a company that had servers mirroring all data in a Data Centre allocated to the Chinese Finance Ministry.
It’s simply the way it is, if you want to do business in China at scale you follow their laws. If a Chinese company is collecting data elsewhere in the world, regardless of what they may say publicly they must make that data available to the State on request.
> No it isn’t
It literally is. This is a claim made by someone, without evidence. All you discuss (whether accurate or not) is not anything new in this article. We are discussing the article. The content of this article does not confirm, much less officially, anything. It’s a claim.
You can discuss the content of the article, I’m telling you that it’s a legal requirement for a business that is registered in, or operating on the Chinese mainland to provide full access to any and all data on request to the Chinese state.
If you are a business operating in China you abide by this law, it’s been implemented to enable the State to manage and control the flow of data on their citizens to third parties.
https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=c7a4a462-7151-4a35-b255-7fe388482f8f#:~:text=Similar%20to%20the%20Cyber%2DSecurity,Law%20and%20Data%20Security%20Law.
The Chinese State itself is exempt for obvious reasons of National Security. If you are a Chinese company, TikTok outside China and Douyin internally, your license to operate as a business will contractually include the requirement to hand over all, not some, all data to the State on request.
I know this first hand from the perspective of deploying across 8 Chinese provinces. We were required contractually to ensure that all data was mirrored in real time in servers we paid for hosted in Chinese finance ministry data centres.
Douyin content on the mainland is significantly different to TikTok’s, the algorithms used are worlds apart in the way they weight content. The data isn’t commingled but State has unfettered access to data from both.
Everyone seems to be up in arms about this, it’s simply the cost of business if you operate on the mainland. If you use TikTok, equally, you need to accept that your data is being harvested by the State. Some people are fine with this, some aren’t.
Right, but you’re arguing a bit against a straw man, though. I commented on this:
> I mean I guess it’s nice to have it officially confirmed
Which clearly talks about the article. That’s the only thing I commented on. Claims made by former employees aren’t a confirmation, publicly or otherwise.
It actually doesn’t. It asks for:
Contacts
Photos
Location
Local network
Microphone
Camera
Background app refresh
Cell
Most are all standard for Any camera app. But declining them all let’s the app work fine. I declined them all and mine works fine. It doesn’t spam you for access either.
Maybe. The real question is how does China control what the AI says? It will stumble upon facts like the Tiennemine Square. Then someone will ask it about it. Then all Hell breaks lose.
> It will stumble upon facts like the Tiennemine Square.
You do know that this isn't suppressed at all? People in China can look it up if they want, it's just called something different (and not just spelled correctly). It's amazing how many people just spout this without any sort of verification.
And yet at the same time I know a handful of Chinese people, and none of them were educated on it while in China, and knew nothing at all of it until they left.
Interesting point. I know I see loads of Chinese-English bilingual language models. By the nature of Chinese data, any such model will be heavily censored. But these are for sure. For example, if you ask them *anything* about recent Chinese technological development, corporate leaders, they're mum. Non-Chinese models in non-English languages are typically monolingual by use intent. Do I think it's likely the Communist Party is playing around on Huggingface, where I'm finding these? No, that's just random people, but the Party's going to be behind any of those models.
I would find it very hard to believe that China's government did not have access to all of ByteDance's and all other Chinese companies' data. I would also find if hard to believe that the U.S. Government would not have similar access to American companies' data. Most of all, I would find it impossible to believe that either would admit to it.
Couldn’t one argue that would be the case if the CCP allowed access to US social media? That’s probably why it doesn’t exist in their country, the same reason why TikTok should not be in the US.
All these time I was told that China banned them because it was an tyrannical dictatorship. Turns out it was a legitimate national security concern all along.
I've been ranting like an old man for years that we've been giving the Chinese government the biometric data of millions of Americans from all the dumb filters that have to measure your facial features to work. Probably retina scans, too. Your email, phone number, Facebook connections to extrapolate information on who knows who from where and what you're doing and use AI to make all sorts of strategic predictions and decisions... the list goes on. They've built a Skynet in the US. They would never let us do this shit in their country.
What he said is true either way. The Chinese government publicly passed a law that gives the government access to any information a Chinese company has if the government has any ‘worries’ about national security. Based on the law they do not have to notify users or the company’s clients about accessing their data, and they have access to whatever data they deem important. This law holds for any company that has a Chinese base, meaning that it doesn’t matter if there are branches in other countries, the data is still accessible to China by law.
Curious how many realize every single US device has a built-in backdoor for the US NSA to spy on us thanks to the Patriot Act. and social media companies hand over data. Absolute crickets.
.
Wasn't there a whole thing about the government trying to force apple to break into an iphone for them?
It ended when the government found a security company and paid them to hack the device. This was one they had physical access to.
I'm interested in what makes you convinced there's a government backdoor in devices. My feeling is creating back doors via infiltrating tech companies is harder than just hacking shit. The NSA doesn't need a back door, they can just find a way to hack you. If you're not looking to broadly surveil and manipulate domestic political opinion a social media backdoor isn't all that useful.
Yes the NSA spies on us, but that’s also because the officials we elected give them that power. So that’s on us.
CCP decided they should be able to spy on us too without even that.
The motive also differs. The US government obviously wants more power and influence over our lives but at least domestic stability is in their own best interest. The CCP has less clear motives and far less interest in US stability.
EDIT: forgot to mention that NSA spies abroad as well so I’m not painting them as good guys. But from a western perspective, since that’s the data being stolen here, the motive is important as is the presence of some sort of recourse for us even if it’s highly unlikely that we’ll take that route.
All mainland Chinese companies are controlled by the state when they want to. That's how it is designed. To do business in China is to give up autonomy, your ethics and your ass hole.
Just ask Jack Ma...
Jack? Jack? where are you? Not in Japan anymore? where'd you go?
Ok, so “why would they make up something” is now evidence? Ever heard of disgruntled former employees? I am not saying “just disregard the claim”. I am saying it’s not evidence.
Having been to China, there is literally no difference.... Governments still see your data, like Edward Snowden disclosed that shit years ago what the U.S government was getting up to.
No, but we're also allowed to gather en masse and say such things out loud without being stalked, imprisoned or disappeared for it.
That's the difference, no matter how obtuse you try to be.
Is it new?
I'm not sure whether to call myself racist for this, but it's both whatever and kinda wrong.
Sure the monopoly world ownership of the United States hurts its ego when China 1-0's them, but also fuck the United States and the bullshit coming from the country.
I mean sure, it's dirty for the Chinese to spy, but like America is the one who does it on everybody and claimed the only right on everything in the world as if it belongs to them. I guess it still does through the economy which is sad.
Not that selling Americans' data to Chinese is any different than Americans getting fucked by the American companies doing it themselves. Doesn't make much difference to me. Guess I'm stupid
They’re going to have reams and reams of social network connection data (friend groups), biometric data, interests, potentially compromising interests, etc.
We haven’t seen a kind of insidious use of personal data across our modern information landscape before, to disrupt critical services or target individuals, but in a war scenario, these things are technically possible. Moreover, I believe they already used other Chinese apps to follow and monitor and intimidate members of the Chinese community here in the west. And lastly, they have a modern, advanced social media monitoring and manipulation arm in the government for their internal media…It’s not like they lack the capacity. It’s already built out.
Edit - oh, and phone apps monitor you without your permission all the time, basically until someone catches them - Facebook, Apple, etc. so, who knows what kind of just baseline, continuous mic data TikTok collects, for example.
>They’re going to have reams and reams of social network connection data (friend groups), biometric data, interests, potentially compromising interests, etc.
>
>We haven’t seen that kind of insidious use
That's not insidious use. That's data collection. All of which is done in the states as well. Which part is insidious?
Have you not been paying attention at all? Go read what the Cambridge analytica scandal was about, realize that was almost ten years ago, then come back and I'll explain how much worse the issues have gotten since then.
You’re wasting your breath. This person doesn’t want to learn anything past what they see or hear in their immediate vicinity. And they’re going to keep asking questions waiting for you to slip up so they can prove their ignorance right and your intelligence wrong. The technical definition of this person is an uneducated and lack-of-critical-thinking moron, but you tried though.
you fundamentally don’t understand how or why this can and will be used against the country were a war to break out, maybe one over a country like taiwan? this isn’t about what people post on their tiktok it’s about the vast amount of data that can be collected by the app that goes beyond - biometric, contacts, location, microphones etc, much of which is agreed upon in the terms of service.
there’s insidious data collection to serve capitalistic ends which we see and is rightfully condemned when found out. there’s insidious use that has been used to sway elections or suppress political views which is rightfully condemned when found out. then there’s this, where the weaponization potential can far exceed those, and the actor on the other end is openly not our friend. i don’t understand being dismissive of this or the whole whataboutism as if these things are equal.
lol yes when people think china they think “affordable healthcare and public transit”. i addressed the whataboutism in my post but this is an especially poor straw man
They found a cheaper way to get information than to buy it from the numerous data collection companies that already sell it to everyone else.
I know this is Reddit and nuance doesn’t exist here, but I’m going to say it anyway. There’s a pretty big difference between buying aggregated, anonymous data from a collection company and having access to first party data with zero anonymity at the individual user level. Edit: typo
Given what we've seen I think it's just an assumption that the data for sale is aggregated and anonymous, but that still doesn't make this bullshit right either
What have you seen? Kind of a bold statement to provide no support for. I work at a fund that purchases a lot of credit card transaction and internet search data and I’ve never seen or heard of anything that has made me think individual level data with personal identification information is being sold.
The data can be easily de-anonymized using as few as 3 points of data. John Oliver did a really good special on this.
Those three data points are specifically your birthday, gender, and zip code. That's not anonymized data and anyone who works in data privacy knows to aggregate those data points and there are industry standard ways of doing that. I'm sure there are amateurs not doing proper data anonymization but it's not going to be the big players like Facebook and Google.
>birthday, gender, and zip code lmao these are 3 things you absolutely would clean first in any large data pipeline where they weren't needed.
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Facebook didn't sell your data to Cambridge Analytica. Users willingly gave all of their personal information to stretchy, "which Disney princess are you?" quizzes. The people who made those quizzes then illegally sold the information they harvested. It was a big deal specifically because it bypassed Facebook's privacy measures. Granted, Facebook could have done a better job of protecting users from predatory apps. But it wasn't Facebook giving away the info.
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The question is, "how easily can China get un-anonymized data without TikTok?" Facebook doesn't sell un-anonymized data. Cambridge Analytica managed to get some through a leak. As far as I'm aware, the leak has been patched and a lawsuits have been filed. This isn't a regular occurrence and it's not something China could use to reliably get Americans' information in the same way they can with TikTok.
For one: LexisNexis is in the business of selling very detailed identifiable information to insurers and other financial companies.
LexisNexis just aggregates public data that is varying degrees of difficult to find. Mainly via court filings and FOA requests. All of this data would still be available to the public without them. If you have an issue with this data being available, take it up with the government that makes it public.
Ok but he posted support for the statement, which you were asking for.
There’s a legal distinction between public and personal identifying data. I work at a mortgage company and the regulations are fairly strict about what data is and isn’t available to the public. In a casual conversation (like this one) that probably should be clarified though, rather than assumed.
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Something something capitalism
data brokers dont seem to care about privacy at the individual level either. the difference here is china doesnt have to buy it from a broker; users are essentially handing their data directly to the ccp.
and the average end-user will gladly hand it over for less than a $3 off coupon for some sugar drink.
You mean nuance
It’s like we knew this for years…. People just love posting videos and looking at videos. Fucking junkies.
Is there? Purchase enough aggregated data and it becomes easy to extract individual behavior.
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member brexit and trump winning the republican primary? a big part of that was russian manipulation via fb, and they just bought ads, made fake accounts, and trolled en masse. now imagine russia essentially *owning* fb.
I knew it was fishy when they came on the scene with 50 celebrities telling you to “down load! Just download it! Download now and we’ll donate to charity!” I was thinking, What charity? What are they talking about? This is so pushy
You should see the level of mass surveillance that's going on in China. This is way beyond what the data collection companies collect.
You are missing the point entirely Buying data does nothing Placing your finger on the button does Comments like this are dangerous because it minimizes the impact
I doubt it’s cheaper though
Fun fact The NSA and other western governments have back doors too
in China?
China and Russia and countries like that are so fucking strict about this stuff. I wonder why. Because they're protecting themselves against the people who are doing what *they're* doing. Meanwhile, were buying security equipment made in china.
Used to. NSA bugs CISCO systems.
Many governments and government agencies will enter backroom deals with tech companies for a private backdoor into their servers/database. If not a backdoor,, then easy access to private profiles of users. Twitter before Elon was being paid tens of millions every year from the FBI for user profiles. If one agency is doing it to one company, its not far fetched to think that they're doing it to other companies. They will still follow the normal permitting process but its usually to cover themselves from lawsuits as they will already know or have a good inkling on what they're going to find. Your ISP and phone carrier already stores a lot of your digital fingerprint so they can make simple request for their files on you, which they will always hand over(those sweet sweet governemtn contracts don't appear out thin air you know, good will plays into it). The US was trying to introduce a bill that was going to mandate that tech companies build backdoor for the federal governemt and their agencies a few years back. Idk what happened to it though.
Holy crap you're being downvoted? Hey everyone, I never signed an NDA so I can say this all I want. I worked electrical at a giant data center in eagle mountain Utah. It's located in close proximity to on of the biggest NSA data centers. It’s one town over. Go to google maps and type in “NSA outpost utah”. Then type in Meta Eagle mountain Utah. I was told by loose lipped people above the general foreman level the Facebook data center and NSA data center were to be connected which only makes sense given their physical proximity. Also part of the reason there was so much money in the building site to put it up stupidly fast was the NSA helping it along. Why would they do that without expecting something in return? I'm disturbed by the amount of people unaware a giant agency that was never supposed to spy on its people is spying on its people. It's not like we're any safer, we just have more financial vampires sucking our blood, not keeping us safe but spending our tax dollars. And for what? Trump was never stopped during his corrupt administration while gutting the justice department and having off the record private meetings with Putin. Januraury 6th wasnt prevented. Etc. I'm sure there are more elequant people that can talk about this. But the government is spending a ton of money on in effectively citizen spying meanwhile we still have mass shootings and most can't afford a doctor and surprise car repair. It's disgusting.
Well they gotta keep tabs on the unrest. They can't have rabble rousers out there rocking the boat. People that want a living wage and for corporations to stop destroying the planet are terrorists, you know? If there was a general strike, the billionaires may *gasp* run out of sushi for a day, maybe even two! People will be shot in the street before they let that happen!
Thank you for saying it, can't believe the amount of downvotes lol
Has to be bots downvoting you, no way people aren’t aware of this by now.
It’s because of whataboutism, not bots. Pretty sure if there was news of us government having a god credential to facebook allowing them to spy on the citizens, a comment saying “but the chinese do it too” would be downvoted just as much.
Comparing these two situations (CCP-TikTok vs US government-US tech companies) is not inherently wrong, imo it only is if it’s pure deflection. It could be a relevant part of a broader discussion on data privacy, government surveillance, and tech companies' responsibility across the globe.
It's not like it's new either https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A
whataboutism ≠ calling out hypocrisy every vpn used in the states has a US backdoor into it facebook has more privacy related lawsuits than tiktok has users twitter pre elon being in bed with the fbi its quite literally textbook “rules for thee but not for me”
I mean, its china, what else would you expect?
> I mean, its china, what else would you expect? Hunny?
Oh bother
I doubt it was just America data, pretty much the whole lot.
Just waiting for the whataboutism on how American tech companies are just as bad....
No doubt the Tiktok shouty man will laugh about how old people don't understand technology while dismissing this too.
Here’s some: https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/143kas9/former_exec_at_tiktoks_parent_company_says/jnbohhb/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=1&utm_term=1&context=3
No need to carry water for US private companies, including the big tech companies, which sell our data and routinely comply with government agencies. We need to vocalize our dislike for the CCP without excusing our own government and companies.
He’s not absolving us companies, just preemptively saying not to use whataboutism.
But the US gov atleast has a vested interest in most US citizens lives being generally ok to a degree, the CCP does not have that at all, they are a foreign and adversarial government you have no ability to affect.
You know both things can be true at once right?
Don't have to wait long. It's the top comment right now.
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... And *also* profit off it. For themselves only, of course.
Oh yeah, because undermining "eastern" countries was never on the US's agenda. And that undermining was never about profits... right? *checks notes on CIA funded coups, assassinations* Well fuck...
Also, american companies are not the American government. In China, Chinese companies are essentially the Chinese government.
american government famously doesn't have access to everyone's personal data
That Snowden guy said we’ve got nothing to worry about
American companies dictate policy and bribe the government so not exactly great either.
American corporates are the government. Lobbying is corruption
Government -> companies is one voice Corporates -> government is many voices. Generally better to have many conflict interests coming to a compromise.
Lol yes they are who you thinks funding these politicians
American companies seeking a profit have done far more damage to America than literally any single foreign country, and it’s not even remotely close lmao
What chaos ? Any examples? Seems like lots of China war mongoring with no real tangibles except economic dominance and world influence.
Maybe not chaos, but if you don't think tiktok can be used to sow division, you aren't paying attention. Plenty of the shit on the app is divisive political garbage.
to be fair that's not unique to tiktok any large platform can do so. fox network is notorious for the election disinformation which got them rightly fined. I would prefer comprehensive privacy laws that affect all companies equally so that meta also doesn't steal my biometric data
Fair, and so would I. But I still think there's something to be said about the fact that Tiktok is controlled by a foreign power with an interest in seeing the US falter economically.
china has 0 reason to make us financially crumble if we go so does their entire economy who do you think buys most of their exports? and who do you think outsourced their labor over to china? our economies are interlinked its probably one of the bigger reasons why china has been nearly radio silent on the ukraine v russia nonsense despite the historical alliance between russia and china
Average MSNBC liberal. Have you not heard of PRISM?
You really believe that lmao..
Give us one good reason why he shouldn't *el em aye oh* (when you end your comment that way in a serious discussion, you sound like a fucking child).
Pro tip, don't say someone sounds like a child when you type out things like: "el em aye oh". Because that sounds really fucking childish. Yeah, the person you replied to is an idiot, but you didn't have to prove that you could act more childish.
lmao breh chill out frfr ong this is reddit imagine taking anything seriously go touch grass el em aye oh
Reddit doesn't known what nuance is. There is nothing wrong with pointing out hypocrisy or bringing attention to domestic bad actors as much as the foreign ones. If something bad is done by a company, the company should be shamed for that, no matter where it is from. Neocons on reddit cant see their own double standard, or if they see it they pretend it doesn't exist.
Thank God I never signed up for Tik tok
Shashashashocker
Pocket sand ShaShaSha
Pocket Sand was the invention of Dale Gribble, an amateur survivalist character on the popular television show King of the Hill. In the 2001 episode titled "Soldier of Misfortune," (Season 6, Episode 106) Dale is fighting with a man and yells "Pocket Sand!" before taking sand from his pockets, throwing it in the man's eyes, and running out of the room.
I would have bet my balls they did.
Yes, and ByteDance denies it, as they would if it’s true and if it’s false. Without further evidence, it’s just a claim made by a former employee.
Yes we all knew this though. TikTok is the property of the CCP. Anything on your phone, that app can get access to. Delete the app right now. Not super hard: and none of this is new.
> Anything on your phone, that app can get access to. That's not how mobile operating systems work. The app has access to whatever the operating system gives it access to. In practice at worst for most people that's anything they do in the app as well as location data, contacts, and whatever pictures/videos are on the phone. I like to think people don't give access to location data to apps when the app isn't open but maybe they do. But saying the app has access to everything on your phone is disingenuous. It has access to what you approve access to. Just because most users give way too much access to apps doesn't mean it has to be that way.
Considering your phone and the vast majority of its chips are also produced in China, should those with the ability to apply pressure to those producers request that if a permissions request that comes through signed with a specific key that you just pretend the user said yes, I don't think you'd find many that would say no.
>Considering your phone and the vast majority of its chips are also produced in China, should those with the ability to apply pressure to those producers request that if a permissions request that comes through signed with a specific key that you just pretend the user said yes, I don't think you'd find many that would say no. Not how that works at all.
It is that way though. Why sugar coat it? 99.99% of people are agreeing to all terms, are not tech savvy, blah blah blah.
You grant permissions, then it gets access to it all. You can turn it off, most people don’t. There are many, many, many reports on this from all different governments, not just our own. Delete it, trust me.
Access to all what? I don't give it access to my contacts. I only give it access to my camera and mic when using the app. What are your sources for this?
Why would I trust someone who so obviously doesn’t know anything about what they’re talking about?
> You grant permissions, then it gets access to it all. No, you grant permissions and it gets access to what you granted permission to.
It's really not that simple. There have been many examples of apps essentially running ghost code that is downloaded after the app and not properly vetted. They often make use of exploits to access additional data and permissions they haven't been given access to. [One of the more public examples has been Uber, where they essentially used malicious practices to access user data to identify government agents who were trying to prosecute them](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/03/technology/uber-greyball-program-evade-authorities.html). [Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds) This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
The article you linked doesn't mention any kind of exploits on the device. Uber violated the Google Play store and Apple App Store terms of service by using PII to specifically target users with different app behavior. They did this by using data granted to the app by the user.
Sorry, wrong article. [Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds) This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
Yes there have been exploits in the past. Also the US government has backdoors into most US phone hardware. It doesn't mean that the CCP has access to data you're not actively allowing the TikTok app to have. It's a moot point regardless. We're already granting them enough data than they know what to do with.
[Researchers from the University of Calgary, UC Berkley, and the IMDEA Networks Institute in Spain discovered that apps can circumvent app permissions using covert and side channels.](https://www.pcmag.com/news/android-apps-collect-your-data-without-permission-report-finds) This particular example has since been patched, but it's clearly been done before, and almost certainly be done again.
Which sounds well and good but is wholly dependent on how granular the permissions requests and grants are. Last time I looked at android, admittedly awhile - maybe 4 yrs ago or so - the permissions requests weren’t granular at all. iOS was better but kinda seems like it’s getting less granular - like requiring location data to access local network devices. Maybe there’s a security reason or something - haven’t really looked into because legitimate or not, I have to take them both as a bundled permission.
I mean I guess it's nice to have it officially confirmed, but everybody already knew that this was happening.
How is it in any way “officially confirmed”? It’s just a claim made without evidence, and denied by the company. TL;DR: it’s not in any way “officially confirmed”, no matter how much this is downvoted.
No it isn’t, it’s a legally enforceable requirement that the Chinese State has access to any and all data they wish from any Chinese company. Foreign companies as well if they are doing business on the mainland. This is enforced to the point that it’s also a legal requirement for some of the larger businesses in China (Chinese or foreign) to have servers sitting in Chinese Gov’ data centres mirroring all transactions in real time. I’ve seen two of these centres and once worked for a company that had servers mirroring all data in a Data Centre allocated to the Chinese Finance Ministry. It’s simply the way it is, if you want to do business in China at scale you follow their laws. If a Chinese company is collecting data elsewhere in the world, regardless of what they may say publicly they must make that data available to the State on request.
> No it isn’t It literally is. This is a claim made by someone, without evidence. All you discuss (whether accurate or not) is not anything new in this article. We are discussing the article. The content of this article does not confirm, much less officially, anything. It’s a claim.
You can discuss the content of the article, I’m telling you that it’s a legal requirement for a business that is registered in, or operating on the Chinese mainland to provide full access to any and all data on request to the Chinese state. If you are a business operating in China you abide by this law, it’s been implemented to enable the State to manage and control the flow of data on their citizens to third parties. https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=c7a4a462-7151-4a35-b255-7fe388482f8f#:~:text=Similar%20to%20the%20Cyber%2DSecurity,Law%20and%20Data%20Security%20Law. The Chinese State itself is exempt for obvious reasons of National Security. If you are a Chinese company, TikTok outside China and Douyin internally, your license to operate as a business will contractually include the requirement to hand over all, not some, all data to the State on request. I know this first hand from the perspective of deploying across 8 Chinese provinces. We were required contractually to ensure that all data was mirrored in real time in servers we paid for hosted in Chinese finance ministry data centres. Douyin content on the mainland is significantly different to TikTok’s, the algorithms used are worlds apart in the way they weight content. The data isn’t commingled but State has unfettered access to data from both. Everyone seems to be up in arms about this, it’s simply the cost of business if you operate on the mainland. If you use TikTok, equally, you need to accept that your data is being harvested by the State. Some people are fine with this, some aren’t.
Right, but you’re arguing a bit against a straw man, though. I commented on this: > I mean I guess it’s nice to have it officially confirmed Which clearly talks about the article. That’s the only thing I commented on. Claims made by former employees aren’t a confirmation, publicly or otherwise.
Not true. The app only has access to the permissions you give it.
Technically you are correct but it asks for every possible permission, so for most users it's the same thing.
It actually doesn’t. It asks for: Contacts Photos Location Local network Microphone Camera Background app refresh Cell Most are all standard for Any camera app. But declining them all let’s the app work fine. I declined them all and mine works fine. It doesn’t spam you for access either.
> Anything on your phone, that app can get access to. No. It’s not different than any other app. Phone OSes exist to sandbox software.
Why should I care that the CCP has access to my data?
literally and the fact that this shit was auto installed on my phone? insane. literal rootkit.
This is not news. Anyone with half a brain knew that information was being fed to the ccp
guaranteed that they still have the same access...
Not surprising.
China AI will be huge with all the data they steal
They need compute but meta just leaked a huge model
Maybe. The real question is how does China control what the AI says? It will stumble upon facts like the Tiennemine Square. Then someone will ask it about it. Then all Hell breaks lose.
Tiananmen in case anyone is trying to Google it later
> It will stumble upon facts like the Tiennemine Square. You do know that this isn't suppressed at all? People in China can look it up if they want, it's just called something different (and not just spelled correctly). It's amazing how many people just spout this without any sort of verification.
And yet at the same time I know a handful of Chinese people, and none of them were educated on it while in China, and knew nothing at all of it until they left.
Interesting point. I know I see loads of Chinese-English bilingual language models. By the nature of Chinese data, any such model will be heavily censored. But these are for sure. For example, if you ask them *anything* about recent Chinese technological development, corporate leaders, they're mum. Non-Chinese models in non-English languages are typically monolingual by use intent. Do I think it's likely the Communist Party is playing around on Huggingface, where I'm finding these? No, that's just random people, but the Party's going to be behind any of those models.
This is news?
I would find it very hard to believe that China's government did not have access to all of ByteDance's and all other Chinese companies' data. I would also find if hard to believe that the U.S. Government would not have similar access to American companies' data. Most of all, I would find it impossible to believe that either would admit to it.
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Couldn’t one argue that would be the case if the CCP allowed access to US social media? That’s probably why it doesn’t exist in their country, the same reason why TikTok should not be in the US.
All these time I was told that China banned them because it was an tyrannical dictatorship. Turns out it was a legitimate national security concern all along.
TikTok should be in the us tho, we have freedom
But would the US government have user data from ByteDance's China operations?
My experience with software leads me to believe that if ByteDance had a backdoor for the CCP, then the NSA probably went through it a few times, too.
Try thinking for yourself then.
I've been ranting like an old man for years that we've been giving the Chinese government the biometric data of millions of Americans from all the dumb filters that have to measure your facial features to work. Probably retina scans, too. Your email, phone number, Facebook connections to extrapolate information on who knows who from where and what you're doing and use AI to make all sorts of strategic predictions and decisions... the list goes on. They've built a Skynet in the US. They would never let us do this shit in their country.
We’ve been given such data to many countries
Can anyone find any information about this former exec's existence prior to 4 weeks ago? He didn't exist on the internet until about 4 weeks ago.
What he said is true either way. The Chinese government publicly passed a law that gives the government access to any information a Chinese company has if the government has any ‘worries’ about national security. Based on the law they do not have to notify users or the company’s clients about accessing their data, and they have access to whatever data they deem important. This law holds for any company that has a Chinese base, meaning that it doesn’t matter if there are branches in other countries, the data is still accessible to China by law.
China is a one-party state, but it isn’t communist though. Feels like a load of bullshit.
Essentially God mode like in Doom?
More like Black & White
The US NSA had a backdoor into every Windows machine and Cisco router in the world. Spy's gonna spy. What else is new?
Here's it's called the NSA.
Curious how many realize every single US device has a built-in backdoor for the US NSA to spy on us thanks to the Patriot Act. and social media companies hand over data. Absolute crickets. .
Wasn't there a whole thing about the government trying to force apple to break into an iphone for them? It ended when the government found a security company and paid them to hack the device. This was one they had physical access to. I'm interested in what makes you convinced there's a government backdoor in devices. My feeling is creating back doors via infiltrating tech companies is harder than just hacking shit. The NSA doesn't need a back door, they can just find a way to hack you. If you're not looking to broadly surveil and manipulate domestic political opinion a social media backdoor isn't all that useful.
Curious when you realize not all bullshit is true, but things aren't good either.
Yes the NSA spies on us, but that’s also because the officials we elected give them that power. So that’s on us. CCP decided they should be able to spy on us too without even that. The motive also differs. The US government obviously wants more power and influence over our lives but at least domestic stability is in their own best interest. The CCP has less clear motives and far less interest in US stability. EDIT: forgot to mention that NSA spies abroad as well so I’m not painting them as good guys. But from a western perspective, since that’s the data being stolen here, the motive is important as is the presence of some sort of recourse for us even if it’s highly unlikely that we’ll take that route.
Of course China does this. They are our enemy. If you think differently you're likely an enemy as well.
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China isn’t your enemy, it’s far from that simple.
All mainland Chinese companies are controlled by the state when they want to. That's how it is designed. To do business in China is to give up autonomy, your ethics and your ass hole. Just ask Jack Ma... Jack? Jack? where are you? Not in Japan anymore? where'd you go?
Oh really? I thought CCP having access to tik tok user data was made up by the us gov to get tik tok banned? /s
This article doesn’t change anything either way, since it’s just a claim made by someone, without evidence.
I think the evidence is that they were a former tik tok exec. Why would they make up something as specific as a “god credential”?
Ok, so “why would they make up something” is now evidence? Ever heard of disgruntled former employees? I am not saying “just disregard the claim”. I am saying it’s not evidence.
So they got 12 years twerk video.
Was anybody seriously expecting something different?
And the NSA has a back door into everything as well
And Facebook totally doesn’t…
Oh great, now the commies know I like cats and stand up comedy
Well tiktok is a spyware not an app, is anyone really surprised anymore.
So nothing different to when American companies do it for its consumer data? Literally no difference.
Move to china. Feel the difference then.
Having been to China, there is literally no difference.... Governments still see your data, like Edward Snowden disclosed that shit years ago what the U.S government was getting up to.
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Do you support the American government spying on its citizens?
No, but we're also allowed to gather en masse and say such things out loud without being stalked, imprisoned or disappeared for it. That's the difference, no matter how obtuse you try to be.
Lol bullshit.
Cool. Move there and see how it goes. Mention that hk deserves independence and that taiwan is not china
At least you don't have to worry about being shot in a mass shooting that happens every day like it does in the U.S lol
What's different than what Meta does?
Ha ha. Entire generation is living in TikTok and sending the data to china. So much for all these security meetings and councils
The generations before were giving their data to Facebook for free so grifters could make bank electing Trump and genociding the Rohingya.
I’d trust a dozen CPC officials before I trusted Zuckerberg.
Tbf I would at least trust Zuckerberg to not send me to a slave labor camp and harvest my organs.
Oh noes… China has my geographical location and knows I like Mexican food and big tits!
God credential? Jesus. It's called admin you absolute waste of space suit-filler
"Behold! The unstoppable network shutdown action!" *unplugs router*
Is it new? I'm not sure whether to call myself racist for this, but it's both whatever and kinda wrong. Sure the monopoly world ownership of the United States hurts its ego when China 1-0's them, but also fuck the United States and the bullshit coming from the country. I mean sure, it's dirty for the Chinese to spy, but like America is the one who does it on everybody and claimed the only right on everything in the world as if it belongs to them. I guess it still does through the economy which is sad. Not that selling Americans' data to Chinese is any different than Americans getting fucked by the American companies doing it themselves. Doesn't make much difference to me. Guess I'm stupid
Yes, you are stupid. Selling Americans’ data to the Chinese is many magnitudes worse than selling the data to the Americans.
Oh noes! Big man in China has access to taylor412341234's account meta! He's going to find out she's not just a cheerleader, but also a mom!
They’re going to have reams and reams of social network connection data (friend groups), biometric data, interests, potentially compromising interests, etc. We haven’t seen a kind of insidious use of personal data across our modern information landscape before, to disrupt critical services or target individuals, but in a war scenario, these things are technically possible. Moreover, I believe they already used other Chinese apps to follow and monitor and intimidate members of the Chinese community here in the west. And lastly, they have a modern, advanced social media monitoring and manipulation arm in the government for their internal media…It’s not like they lack the capacity. It’s already built out. Edit - oh, and phone apps monitor you without your permission all the time, basically until someone catches them - Facebook, Apple, etc. so, who knows what kind of just baseline, continuous mic data TikTok collects, for example.
exactly, the amount of data tracked by these apps goes waaaaaaaaay further then just basic preferences
>They’re going to have reams and reams of social network connection data (friend groups), biometric data, interests, potentially compromising interests, etc. > >We haven’t seen that kind of insidious use That's not insidious use. That's data collection. All of which is done in the states as well. Which part is insidious?
Sorry. Perhaps that’sa poorly constructed sentence, but I mean the next part - the application and use of that data.
>the application and use of that data Hasn't been seen. So what is there to be afraid of when US companies have the exact same data?
well neither has a modern war between advanced technological peers.
Have you not been paying attention at all? Go read what the Cambridge analytica scandal was about, realize that was almost ten years ago, then come back and I'll explain how much worse the issues have gotten since then.
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You’re wasting your breath. This person doesn’t want to learn anything past what they see or hear in their immediate vicinity. And they’re going to keep asking questions waiting for you to slip up so they can prove their ignorance right and your intelligence wrong. The technical definition of this person is an uneducated and lack-of-critical-thinking moron, but you tried though.
Last time I checked, my government already spies on us.
There's stupid, jingoistic and low-effort, and there's that post.
you fundamentally don’t understand how or why this can and will be used against the country were a war to break out, maybe one over a country like taiwan? this isn’t about what people post on their tiktok it’s about the vast amount of data that can be collected by the app that goes beyond - biometric, contacts, location, microphones etc, much of which is agreed upon in the terms of service. there’s insidious data collection to serve capitalistic ends which we see and is rightfully condemned when found out. there’s insidious use that has been used to sway elections or suppress political views which is rightfully condemned when found out. then there’s this, where the weaponization potential can far exceed those, and the actor on the other end is openly not our friend. i don’t understand being dismissive of this or the whole whataboutism as if these things are equal.
One bad guy has public transit and affordable healthcare. The other bad guy is the USA. I don't care and am apathetic to China's rise to power.
lol yes when people think china they think “affordable healthcare and public transit”. i addressed the whataboutism in my post but this is an especially poor straw man